


Breathe new life into me

by ThatOnePlatypus



Series: Deep space and distant stars [1]
Category: Naruto
Genre: Gen, Minor Character Death, Space AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-26
Updated: 2019-02-26
Packaged: 2019-11-06 04:22:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,354
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17932742
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThatOnePlatypus/pseuds/ThatOnePlatypus
Summary: If there is one duty that Madara hates more than any others, it’s moon-watching. Staying lying on the ground, eyes peeled on the sky for any attack for hours isn’t really his idea of fun.





	Breathe new life into me

**Author's Note:**

> This bit didn't go as planned At All. The Aburame snuck in along with the world-building and a few feels, and here we are.  
> Enjoy!

If there is one duty that Madara hates more than any others, it’s moon-watching. Staying lying on the ground, eyes peeled on the sky for any attack for hours isn’t really his idea of fun.

Oh, when he was younger, he’d actually _liked_ it. Made him feel useful to his family, that he could watch for enemies in the sky.

Growing up, though, the duty is now a mix of boring and anxiety-inducing, and Madara loathes it.

“Anything?” Shigure asks, from where he’s mixing tea and stirring soup.

“Clouds, sky, stars,” Madara lists off dully, eyes automatically cataloging the strategic points where any attacks would come from. “Stupid Senju seems quiet today.”

“Senju is never quiet,” Shigure snorts, and glances up.

Hi is a dark red shadow, the gas giant barely letting enough sunlight for them to see the other moons that orbit around it. Senju, the neighbouring moon to Uchiha, is a large blue and green orb in the sky, illuminated still by the sun. Soon, for them too it’ll be night, Hi’s shadow falling on them, and they might attack at that moment, under the cover of darkness.

Really, it’s just stupid. At this point, everyone expects it. There’s no surprise, no excitement, nothing but dread and frustration and death. Death, death, more death, and revenge at the end, and endless cycle.

Madara is so sick of this war.

He's sick of war, of death, and of moon-watching duty.

A flicker of fire in his periphery makes him turn his head, just in time to see Izuna fly through the air towards him. Madara squawks, but isn’t fast enough, and gets a whole annoying little brother on him.

“Got you!” Izuna crows gleefully, eyes sparking red.

Madara’s only answer is to wheeze, his little brother’s weight crushing his lungs. Something catches deep in his throat, rattling like flints, and he pales even as his stomach suddenly flares with warmth.

“Uh, shit,” Izuna says, probably having heard the same tell-tale sound.

Very quickly, he jumps off Madara’s stomach, stumbling in his haste to get away. Madara inhales deeply, finally able to breathe. Turns out, this is a mistake, because the sudden influx of air just makes things worse, igniting the whole gas pocket in Madara’s pipes.

It’s all he can do to shoot upright, and forcefully eject everything.

A fireball the size of a small starship illuminates the night, burning blue and green at the edges.

Madara coughs out some smoke, a few more purple flames flickering in his breath, before he carefully takes a new breath. This time, there’s no rattle, no sudden influx of gas, and he slumps back down, relieved. On the side, Shigure is letting out a smoke signal to let the other observations points know that it was a false alarm, looking bored. Madara flushes, feeling guilty for his lapse in control.

A small giggle reminds Madara of the culprit.

“Izuna,” he growls, immediately shooting upright again, intent on grabbing his brother and hanging him upside down over the nearest body of water.

Izuna makes a small _eep_ , and scampers off.

Growling, Madara watches him go, half tempted to follow after. Unfortunately, he’s still on moon-watch duty.

“Little brothers,” Shigure comments, as Madara slumps back down once again to watch the sky. “They’re all the same.”

“Izuna is worse,” Madara grumbles darkly.

Really, his stupid little brother ought to know better. It's not just a matter of causing a false alarm. The _last time_ he did something like that, Madara was throwing up plasma for _days_ afterwards! Mother almost thought he’d never be able to fire-breathe ever again.

Not that Madara is very good at that to begin with.

He never really could breathe fire the way his cousins or his father can. His inner fire has always been in shades of blue and plasma purple, instead of their fire-orange and hot-red.

Mother said it’s not a bad thing, though.

There’s a tale, in the clan, that the Uchiha people descend from one of the Star Eaters, one from the legends. That it’s why they aren’t harmed by fire, and why they can breathe it out. After all, stars are gaz and fire and plasma.

The Uchiha are fire-breathers, and all of them have a star in their chest.

Madara’s just happens to burn warmer than most, to be closer to a real star than the others.

Madara likes that idea. Makes him feel a bit special, and not defective like some of his cousins say.

Speaking of stars, though. He squints, looking at a strange formation far away. Not on the Senju side, which is good, but not normal either.

“Shigure,” Madara calls, and points to the sky. “There’s something strange next to Aburame. Looks like a moving constellation.”

“Shit, where?” Shigure says, leaving his soup and tea in favour of looking at the sky. He sees the light Madara is pointing out, and lets out a fervent plea at the sky, digging his pockets for a lens, “Please don’t be a swarm, please don’t be a swarm.”

Uchiha and Aburame have never been truly hostile with each other, their moons too distant, and their people never having wronged each other. There are horror stories about Aburame swarms, though, about what happens to those stupid enough to cross them. Madara, alarmed, frantically paws his own pockets for a lens as well. Finding the one father gave him, he looks up at the same spot again. In unison, both he and Shigure let out curses.

The trail of lights, from a distance, look innocent enough. With the lens’ help, though, it’s easy to discern the bug-like shape of the Aburame ships. Although they look different from usual, like nothing Madara has ever seen before, rounder and with huge lights coming from their hind-reactors, it’s not a comforting sight.

“What are they thinking?” Shigure mutters, adjusting his own lens to see better. “What’s the purpose of putting such big reactors on your ships? They’re so easy to see coming!”

“Maybe they’re not fighter ships,” Madara comments, slowly – although he too doesn’t see the point. If your ship isn’t made for fighting, then stealth is a must.

“Aburame people can murder you with weapons the size of a flea,” Shigure snorts, shaking his head. “And the shape of it, too. There’s no such thing as a non-fighter Aburame ship.”

Madara doubts it. There _must_ be leisure ships, even among such scary people as those that live on Aburame.

“They look a bit like fireflies,” Madara reflects, still tracking the swarm of ships.

“True,” Shigure murmurs. “Maybe it’s a diversion?”

Madara shrugs. He doesn’t think so, but does a check anyway. No matter where he looks, though, space is still the same as always, no enemies in sight except for those firefly ships.

They are rather pretty, Madara muses. He wonders what they’d look like from up close. Not that he really _wants_ to find out, especially if this swarm is a hostile one, but he’s curious.

“Madara,” Shigure suddenly says, “Light a signal. I think they’re headed our way.”

Madara’s stomach almost rebels in sudden anxiety, but still he puts down his lens and stands up, taking a deep breath. He can feel his stomach roil with fire, and turns to his uncle.

“What signal?” He checks.

Shigure doesn’t answer immediately. When he does, it’s with a slight twist of his lips.

“Let’s go with the non-hostile but still alarming one,” he says. “We don’t want to attack them without cause, just in case.”

Madara nods, and inhales, deep and long.

The tongue of blue-purple fire he breathes out in the shape of a circle is probably visible from leagues away. Soon, in the distance, similarly shaped fire signals appear, red, orange, blue, painting the horizon in colours.

Madara looks away one last time, at the swarm of light that is steadily getting bigger. He hopes, _really_ hopes, that they chose the right signal for this.

Then, coughing up a nervous flicker of flame, Madara jumps down the observation point.

He needs to warn his mother.

 

 

 

There’s fire around him.

Blinking blood out of his eyes, Madara uncurls from his position, having instinctively made himself smaller when his cockpit exploded.

All around him, there are parts floating, metal parts and glass torn apart by the force of the blast. It seems it wasn’t just the cockpit, but his entire ship that got destroyed. The hull lies in pieces among the stars, around him. Whoever fired at him really wanted him dead.

Too bad for them, Madara has a protector.

Susanoo. That’s the name that comes to his mind, unbidden, in his mother’s voice, as he takes in the giant ribs around him, and the spectral guardian encasing him.

It was one of her favourite old gods, in the legends, a warrior, the master of storms, and Madara thinks it a fitting name.

There’s certainly a storm brewing in his soul as he takes in the graveyard around him.

Ship parts, familiar ones, as far as his eyes can see.

He had known they all suffered the same fate – had seen his father’s ship explode right before his own got blasted – but somehow he had expected… Expected…

_Less death_.

And yet, no one is moving in the wrecks. He can see one of his cousins, not moving, a small league away. He can see the broken shape of Tajima’s small but fast star-dweller, further away. A small ship, built for stealth and not defense nor attack.

They hadn’t even been _attacking_ anyone. Just out on the journey to Aburame, to fulfill their part of the deal they struck, all those years ago when the first swarm came to Uchiha. They had been  _traveling_ , and that's all.

And someone had taken advantage of it to annihilate them.

Madara grits his teeth, even as the ghostly figure of fire around him flickers hotter. It doesn’t feel too much, feels almost comforting, even, but he doesn’t want _comfort._

He’s got a star in his chest, and a star around him. That makes him special.

That makes him the sole survivor of his squad.

He _burns._

Madara has no idea how long he stays there, simmering in his rage and grief, a single giant of flame in the middle of a massacre. The now familiar light of a firefly ship is what draws his attention away from his own misery.

“Identify yourself,” the monotone order carries over rather badly in the void, but Madara still understands it.

As an answer, he deactivates his Susanoo. It's as easy as breathing out, leaving him with only his space armour for protection and air. The Uchiha fan, painted on his chest-plate, glows steadily, a clear identifier.

Immediately, the firefly ship comes closer, the solar pannels in the shape of wings lifting to reveal the door. Madara, in a daze, grabs onto it, and hoists himself up. A second later, the door slides open, and he crawls inside.

Firefly ships aren’t built to accommodate many people. They are small ships, bulbous and pretty, made for speed and warning – anyone who sees their glow and still attacks invites ruthless retaliation.

Madara feels cramped in the back, staring at the Aburame pilot sitting in the front seat, and the guard in the backseat.

“Uchiha-san,” the pilot says, sounding bewildered and concerned – for an Aburame, at least. “We came as soon as it became obvious that your convoy was late. What happened?”

“Ambush,” Madara replies, and maybe it’s a bit too sharp, but his family is dead outside. “I didn’t see who, it was too fast.”

“No one but our allies knew of this,” the Aburame guard points out, uneasiness twisting at her mouth.

No one replies, but there’s no need for anyone to speak the obvious aloud. It means someone betrayed them.

Madara clenches his fists, and directs his glare at the cabin floor. Whoever it is, they will _pay_.

“Uchiha-san, what do you want us to do?” The pilot suddenly says. “We can bring you back-”

“No need,” Madara says, and breathes out slowly. He’s not an uncontrolled youth anymore, and so even through his fury, he doesn’t let out a single flame slip from his lips. “As of today, my father is dead, and I am the leader of my people. I will need to speak of this with your leader, and will carry out the agreed tasks.”

“Alone?” The guard says, slowly.

Madara can understand her hesitation. There’s a reason a whole group of Uchihas always came, and that was because fulfilling their part of the contract – namely, providing plasma and gas for the Aburame reserves – takes a toll on them. They might be able to create those things naturally, but it’s tiring to replenish anyway.

But Madara feels like he is bursting to the seams with fire, and right now he needs an outlet.

“I’ll do it,” he states again, and the two Aburame share a look but eventually nod in agreement.

“What about…” the guard trails off, gaze going to the window.

Madara looks at the shipwrecks and the bodies, and feels his heart turn over in his chest again. His tongue feels tied.

“We can send a few more fireflies to get them, and send them back to Uchiha,” the pilot suggests, not unkindly.

“Yeah,” Madara agrees, voice coming out a bit hoarse. “Yeah, I- I would like that, please.”

“Of course, Uchiha-sama,” the Aburame says.

The honorific sits in the air, a weight added to Madara’s shoulders unexpectedly.

Uchiha-sama was his mother, and then his father.

Now, it’s him.

A part of him reminds him that at least, he still has everyone else back home, on Uchiha. At least, he still has Izuna.

Izuna, who has no idea of what happened, and won’t know until Madara gets back.

Eyes suddenly burning again for a whole new reason that has nothing to do with his sharingan, he curls in on himself.

If Madara’s tears float in the cabin as they fly to Aburame, the pilot and the guard are kind enough not to mention it.


End file.
